The Caribbean, 2002
A little boy toddled along the docks, part of the collection of children trailing after an older boy, who was playing captain. This particular little boy was clutching a hook, stolen from an unwatchful pirate, and he brandished it like a sword. He was too young to understand why the adults were terrified by the appearance of a strange ship on the horizon, a ship flying a blue-and-yellow crest.
They had been branded as villains, those adults. It was difficult to track anyone across the wide expanse of ocean, and countless unnamed islands offered no shortage of hiding places, so the sea-faring villains were the last to be rounded up and sent to the Isle of the Lost. But finally the last of the miscreants had been discovered holed up on Tortuga.
Royal guards descended on Tortuga, outnumbering the pirates three to one. The capturing began. Some offered themselves up easily, hoping to barter, but most fought or tried to flee. They were hardened seamen, after all. They had faced storms and crazy crocodiles and the British Navy.
The little ones were among the first taken, and with the loss of their children, the fight went out of most of the women. Young mothers agreed to cooperate, if only their offspring were unharmed. The guards were not heartless; once they were magically bound in the hold of the ship, families were reunited. Soon crying toddlers were in their mothers' comforting arms. Well, most of them were.
The little boy carrying a hook didn't have a mother to hold him, so the guards passed the sobbing kid off to the pirate who seemed most likely to be his father.
Loaded down with villainous cargo, the Auradon ship weighed anchor at sunset. One pirate had escaped its long shadow, through a combination of his wit and…well, being an antihero isn't exactly the same as being a villain, is it?